It almost seems silly to review Sin City at this point. It's like reviewing Watchmen or Dark Knight Returns; it's a seminal comics work by an acknowledged comics master and whether you like it or not, you probably know what it's all about. Except it's a black and white book, and some folks turn their nose up at black and white books, but now that it's going to be made into what looks like a kickass flick, maybe they'll get over that particular bias and give this one a look, and if I can help encourage that, then all the better. Because Sin City was great when it first came out, but these new, slick redesigned trade paperbacks are just like sweet chocolate icing on a perfect cake, and it's just impossible to resist the temptation to talk about them. I'll probably review more of them as the weeks go on, but for now, let's take a look at The Hard Goodbye, the first (and for my money, best) Sin City story.
The Hard Goodbye got its name for this new trade release, for the longest time it was just known as Sin City, because the whole thing didn't start off as a series or even a trade. Instead, it was a short little feature in Dark Horse Presents, perfect little 8 page jolts of crime, violence, sex and all the cool stuff that makes Sin City great. What's kind of amazing about The Hard Goodbye is that it as strong as it was in serial format, it works just as well as a collected story, with the tension rising, the violence escalating and the mysteries unfolding at just the right pace. Sin City is a throwback in some ways, to true pulp fiction in some extent and to EC's crime comics to another, playing into the readers' desire for cheap thrills of sex and violence but delivering a strong story and fascinating, memorable characters at the same time.
At the center of The Hard Goodbye is Miller's most memorable Sin City character, Marv. He's hardly the only iconic character introduced in the pages of this book, and special mention must also go to stripper goddess Nancy, but from the start, Marv and Sin City have been almost synonymous, because he embodies what the series is about. He's a tough guy, but he's a real tough guy who has to get punished and feel pain and sometimes even lose, rather than just standing up like your average Hollywood tough guy action hero. He's not always right, he might even be crazy, and Miller holds out the possibility for most of the story that there was no killer, that Marv did it himself in a fit of delusion, but the twists that come are more interesting than that.
If Marv is the iconic hero of Sin City, he's certainly not the only thing clearly establishing the book's identity in this first story. The notion of these almost superheroic and yet vulnerable protagonists, a character type we'll see again in Hartigan and (to a lesser extent) Dwight, is built up in Marv's fight scenes with the cops or his fight scene with Kevin. He crashes through doors, smashes in through windows of cars, bounces off the hood of other cars and basically takes on small groups of foes in the most brutal, quick fashion possible. The sensual vibe of Sin City is also to be found throughout Hard Goodbye, with Miller showing off his ability to not only design solidly built tough guys and hard-edged geography, but soft, angelic, perfect women. There's a weird vibe to the nudity of Sin City... it's everpresent, from the delicious Nancy to Goldie to Lucille, but it's never really presented as sleazy. Instead, these gorgeous, naked angels are almost the flipside of the hard-edged goons that make up the rest of the city. There's definitely a cheap thrill to be found in Miller's curvy, model-perfect babes, but they're not just there for titillation. The naked women, as much as the casual violence, are a crucial part of Sin City's tone.
Plenty has been written analyzing Miller's artwork in Sin City, so I'll just say that for those of you who generally eschew black and white, Sin City is probably the best counter-argument. Miller's characters emerge from pools of shadow, images are formed by sparse white lines against a black backdrop, and for all of its deceptive simplicity, Miller also provides every crag in Marv's face, every crack in the brick of the city. The art of Sin City builds atmosphere, it tells the story and it informs the characters. Even if the story weren't a pure shot of noir joy, the artwork alone would make this book a must-read.
Chip Kidd has brought his design sensibilities to the party as well, and done the art and the tone of the book justice. The smaller, bookstore-friendly size still displays the artwork surprisingly well, and little things like the matching spines that form a picture of Nancy dancing, the close-up face shots of important characters or the selection of a noteworthy page to adorn the back cover makes the book look as cool as it is. There are quibbles to be had, notably a binding process which allows the book to open more fully but which seems likely to split and separate after many readings and the strange decision to lose the distinctive Sin City logo for a boring new one, but these are very minor quibbles. Sin City: The Hard Goodbye is every bit as good as you remember, and if you've never read it, put it at the top of your reading list. 10/10
